Anxious Hearts
by Orihalcon
Summary: The life of a man of the slums, told through one night. One-shot. Reviews are appreciated! :)


**Anxious Hearts**

Dim lights broke into a subtly chaotic spectra through the plain glass. The amber liquor slowly flowed from a half-empty bottle, discreetly throwing insignificant drops that remained confined in the glass prison, its sound drowned by a tired radio and the noise of meaningless chatter. Select rays of light that broke through the surface of the liquid created a reflection of warm colors as if hiding a perfect gem.

Fool's gold in liquid form. The false promise of hope, a mirage of a cure without worth.

Lugo picked up the glass and let the smallest sip slip past his lips, allowing the liquid to sting his tongue for a second before passing on the burning sensation down his throat. He watched the woman behind the bar slide the coins on the table to her hand and put them away. She was very attractive; her thick brown hair reached past her back, her feminine forms were pleasant to the eye, and her vibrant mahogany eyes carried a warmth that spoke against her reputation, and indeed, her prowess; he had seen the woman floor grown men with her fists.

The sound of the doors swung open broke through the noise. Lugo invested no effort in turning around; he wasn't expecting anyone. His visits to Seventh Heaven were frivolous. Like everyone he knew, numbing the mind and the occasional nightly company was all he had. He had not written a word in years. It was an affliction of the mind that still pricked his soul and gnawed at his back, and one that he had conceited to.

He felt a hand on his shoulder. A woman's hand, no doubt; it was small and light to the touch.

'Hey-o, handsome.' He turned around and smiled faintly.

'Good evening, Feyn.' He rose to his feet and offered the short brunette his stool. The woman sat down without hesitation, barely acknowledging the gesture. He ordered her a drink.

'How are ya?'

'Not too bad. Chilling under the pie. And you?'

'Not the best day.' She sighed and looked over his shoulder. He ignored the obvious signal and allowed himself another taste of his drink.

'Aren't you usually over at the Tantalus?'

'That's where we _both_ usually go, but...'

'You bumped into a retard and fled the scene.' Feyn laughed. He was pleasantly surprised; he had expected a forced chuckle mixed with a tint of bitter sarcasm.

'I actually felt like seeing you,' she replied and slyly rested her head against the palm of her hands. 'I had a feeling you'd be here.'

She bit her lip playfully and smiled. The bartender popped up with a red drink in a slightly larger glass and placed it in front of Feyn. Lugo shoved his hand in his pocked and pulled out a few gil and placed them on the table.

'I'm not sure I like this place,' he said and took another sip. 'Too many roughnecks.'

'Could it be that Lugo is afraid of a bit of spanking?'

'Not if you're the one doing it.' They both laughed. This time, the laugh was forced, and he wasn't sure if hers was genuine.

'I'm thinking about quitting my job,' she said after a minute.

'Really? Why's that?'

'I don't know, I'm not cut out to sit on my ass and sell stuff.'

'I hear that.'

'Besides,' she said and let out a huge sigh, 'it would be nice to move to a different sector.'

'Like it fucking matters. It's all the same under the plates.'

'Someone's having a dark day,' she teased. It bothered him, but appreciated her hand rubbing his leg. It was somehow comforting.

'So where are you thinking of moving?'

'My friend Lena said they're looking for people at the restaurant just a couple of minutes away from here.'

'Here?'

'Yeah, it's just about two buildings away from the Materia shop.'

'I don't know how they get by, that stuff costs like a thousand gil, and nobody around here knows how to use it, anyway.'

Feyn laughed, but Lugo continued.

'I mean I get it, if you own Materia, you have something really special, but it's not worth shit if you can't use it. And where do they even get their hands on it, anyway?'

'You worry too much,' said Feyn conclusively and had some of her drink.

'Is that good?' he asked and nodded at her drink with a coy smile. Feyn returned the nod and drank some more.

'It's really good.'

'It looks good. It looks cold, and good.' He waited for the bartender and ordered the same drink.

As their glasses emptied and refilled, the dance continued, a play of nothingness. Time flowed as it ever did, and carried with it the end of another day of their meaningless existence.

Fool's gold in liquid form. Empty promises and fickle hope.

Few words were traded between the two when they left the bar. With clouded judgement, Lugo quickly found the back of a house against which he pressed Feyn and slid his hand inside her pants. Her arms fumbled around him, and their kisses were not out of lust for one another, but out of desire to repel the loneliness they knew would they would carry with them their entire lives. They knew what this was and what it wasn't. She was not immediately receptive of his hand, and only after a minute did she widen her legs.

Few minutes passed before they were done, and neither seemed entirely displeased with parting ways. Lugo waited for the mildly flustered woman to disappear before he reached for the pack of cigarettes in his jacket. The cigarette barely lasted him halfway through his short walk past the rundown slums to the train station.

A man with blonde hair and a gigantic sword stood not too far away from him. Next to him was a man with a large fire arm grafted onto his arm, and three others who seemed far more ordinary by comparison. They were the only ones at the train station. Lugo decided not to spare them a second glance; they looked suspicious and extremely hostile, and he didn't rule out the possibility that they were members of a resistance group. Pointless endeavor, he thought; there was no sense in opposing the army of the world's dominating corporation when you were nothing but a piece of shit slumdog.

The train eventually rolled in, its screech accompanied by the violent sparks from its slightly rusted wheels. The doors opened, and Lugo quietly boarded one of the cars and found a seat diagonally across a middle-aged couple, and a few seats away from a man sleeping under a rugged quilt with folded magazines for a pillow.

The train made a stop near the reactor in Sector 1 where Lugo lived. He closed his eyes and thought of tomorrow. Another day without meaning. It was a twist of fate: Despite being one of the best writers he had come across in person, he had not gotten close to any kind of decent job above the plate. Of course, far from everyone who lived in the slums could read or write, but none of the private companies ever looked to slum dwellers for hiring, and Shinra officials he was sure posted job openings only to present the poor with false hope and to keep them from making too much of a mess.

The train made yet another stop, and Lugo snickered spitefully at the irony. His life, like this train, was set on a fixed path, and like the passenger of a train, there was no control, no way of deciding his destination. He could either give up and get off early, or he could wait until the train had reached its final destination, and then he had to get off.

Finally, the train had reached the second station at the sector 1 slums. He exited the train and began a slow walk towards the western district. The distance sound of footsteps and irregular banging from inside select houses were the small exceptions to a nonexistent soundscape. The silence was not really deafening; a low hum that fell on the slums from the plate above continuously permeated the air.

The air suddenly growled and the ground shook furiously. A deafening noise unlike anything else he had heard before boomed past the entire district. Almost immediately after, he heard a barely audible bassy sound drop heavily in pitch, followed by the lights on the streets and every room going out without discrimination. The entire sector fell into darkness. The wind continued to carry a low, rumbling sound for several minutes before it completely died out.

Lugo looked around and sighed. He procured another cigarette from his jacket, lit it calmly, and inhaled deeply. A jet of smoke passed his lips as his gaze wandered to the plate above him.


End file.
